Program scripts from week of September 10, 2012
My name is Jay Phillippi and I've spent my life in and around the media. TV, radio, the movies and more. I love them, and I hate them and I always have an opinion. Call this the View from the Phlipside.
Chris Berman
ESPN decided to make a big announcement last week. You may not have noticed but the last year or two have been a little rough at the World’s Leader in Sports. They’ve had some high profile folks leave, there have been complaints about how female staffers are treated, just a few small details like that. So what do you do when folks are talking about everything other than your product? You make a big announcement.
And true to the sports world model that they cover ESPN went with the announcement of a big contract extensions for one of their stars. Oh let’s be honest, it’s a contract extension for thier equivalent of the starting quarterback, the home run king power hitter, fill in your favorite sports figure here, Chris Berman.
Like him or hate him, and there are plenty of people in both camps, Berman is The Man at ESPN. And why not? He’s outlasted pretty much any other contender to the throne. Berman was hired just a month after ESPN launched and has been the mainstay, voice and face of the network pretty much ever since.
As I read the coverage of the story I thought to myself “That’s not Chris Berman’s only claim to fame. He’s also responsible for the mess that sports journalism is in right now”. That’s right I believe Chris Berman is responsible for everything that’s wrong in sports media today.
Once upon a time sports coverage was about, here’s a novel thought, SPORTS! The games themselves and the people who played them. Unfortunately today the games appear to exist only to give an entire industry of talking heads something to rant and rave about. It would be one thing if we were getting some intelligent conversation out of it. Instead we get Jim Rome and the cadre of wannabe’s following in his footsteps who are making a living out of being the person we all hate at the games. The loud mouth know it all who won’t just shut the bleep up.
Once upon a time you only noticed the sportscaster when they did a really good job describing the action. Today too often we can’t get them to get out of the way so we can even see the action. The transitional step between the days of Vin Scully and Jim Rome? I’m afraid that would be Chris Berman.
Hey Chris for this new contract how about making it be about the game again?
The Future of Radio
I had a very interesting conversation the other day with a friend of mine who is still toiling in the media mines of Radio. It backed up something I’d come across from “Professional Music Geek” and blogger Alan Cross.
Cross points out that radio is slowly killing itself. Not through programming choices or the slow erosion of aging technology or even by being stuck in an old business model. Radio is killing itself because it’s leaving nowhere for the next generation of radio stars to be born. When my buddy and I were talking we had both noted that it was hard to encourage young broadcasting students about careers in radio because neither of us see much room to build a career in radio.
Let me use my own career as a model. I started at a day time only Country station in southwestern PA. I did the local news for the first half of the day. Then I got the chance to try my hand at my own program. I next moved up to Erie PA as a copywriter and production director. I made a lot of mistakes there but had the room to learn and grow. Another station put me back on the air, then I was hired here in Jamestown as a swing shift announcer. That’s the bottom of the barrel. No regular shift, you work when you’re needed. I got lucky, a full time slot on a certain radio station opened up and it was full speed ahead from there.
The problem is that most of the jobs I did on my way to full time in a drive time slot don’t exist any more. Small market stations have largely eliminated local news, sales people write their own copy and with more automation there are fewer slots to learn and grow in. It’s not even a safe haven to be the “established star” (certain folks here in Jamestown being the exception to the rule) because lots of those people are being cut for budget reasons.
So where will the next generation of radio stars learn their craft? A lot of folks think it’s easy to be a radio DJ. That’s basically true. It is very, very, very HARD to be a good one. Like anything it takes practice, dedication and a clear understanding of the ins and outs of creating a great product.
The industry as a whole appears to be happy turning out cookie cutter mediocre radio. Doing great radio requires taking a chance. Sometimes it’s taking a chance on a young, untested announcer who just might grow up to be something special. Not many places to learn how to do great radio any more.
Fake Reality
Any time I hear someone deciding to try something that’s worked before I hear Doc Brown’s words to Marty McFly as he talks about going back to the future. Relying on the past is not always the best decision but if you choose your spots it just might work.
For example if you’re a nationally advertised product right now you know you’re up against a couple different problems. First of all most media consumers just don’t like commercials as a general rule. Second we now live in a era where you can avoid them if you want. Between people recording programs and watching them later (called time shifting) and fast forwarding through the commercials to the newest technology which allows you to do basically the same thing with live broadcasts the advertiser has to find some way of making sure their message gets heard.
So a tip of the lid to the folks at Aleve, the over counter pain killer. They’ve taken a cue from broadcasting history to make sure their message is heard on the syndicated program Jeopardy. Now in the old days a company would simply sponsor the entire program. There’s a reason why soap operas are called that. Laundry soap companies paid the freight for the program. Pretty much no one does that any more. But Aleve has a new variant.
They provide the cash for the second and third place contestants, insuring their name gets mentioned. They buy a ton of ads on each show all week and they buy the very last slot just before the Final Jeopardy answer is revealed. They then mimic the Final Jeopardy screen and insert a product related question and answer. In the end you are going to find it very hard to avoid the product. And that is the function of advertising.
This is an example of a company taking a look at the reality of the market in which they have to compete. No whining about how hard it is or unfair. They find a model that offers them the best results they can get and they commit to it.
In the past or in the future that’s almost always a winning formula.
Call that the View From the Phlipside.
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